


When Unbelievable Meets Unimaginable

by D_OShae



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Gen, Prequel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-16
Updated: 2019-02-16
Packaged: 2019-10-29 17:33:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17812385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/D_OShae/pseuds/D_OShae
Summary: Draco Malfoy, alone and bereft in his family mansion, begins to contemplate his recent past. In the midst of his bitter ruminations, he spies unusual activity on the estate grounds. It then leads to an unexpected confrontation that shows a spark of light on a cold winter day.[NOTE: Originally written forkorlaenaafter I read her(?) excellent storyA Sword Laid Aside. I needed to explain to myself how Draco managed to change himself or what provided the impetus. I mixed her work with one of my favorite subjects.]





	When Unbelievable Meets Unimaginable

**Author's Note:**

  * For [korlaena](https://archiveofourown.org/users/korlaena/gifts).
  * Inspired by [A Sword Laid Aside](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16062536) by [korlaena](https://archiveofourown.org/users/korlaena/pseuds/korlaena). 



The manor sat cold and quiet. What little life it contained ebbed from the grounds and walls ages ago. With the family name in tatters, his mother departed, and his father imprisoned, Draco sat in the near empty shell of the Malfoy Manor. Voldemort once held court in the great hall of the mansion, yet the Dark Lord met his demise at the hands of a what amounted to a boy. Since then all things Malfoy began to unravel. Pure-blood status no longer counted for anything. The vast fortune of his family dwindled to a mere pittance, barely enough to keep Draco in a lifestyle befitting his expectations.

“My how the mighty have fallen,” he bemoaned in the study where only a rudimentary desk remained and pulled his dark robes closer about his thin carriage.

The bare shelves of expensive dark wood only collected dust instead of books, parchment, and scrolls. The rich pile carpeting still bore the marks of the sumptuous furniture that formerly adorned the room. High, arched windows inlaid with panes of leaded glass stood without the heavy black velvet drapes. Sunlight, once a foreigner to his father’s study, now ran roughshod through the stripped room. All that once filled the space either got taken by the Ministry for Magic as evidence during his and his father’s trials or else sold to keep the estate in the hands of Draco. He grunted in frustration and banged his hand against the desk, formerly found in the servants quarters, and listened to the dull echo.

“Not even a house elf,” Draco grumbled. “Gone. All gone.”

Yet he truly did not refer to the missing wealth. The memory of his mother haunted and stalked him throughout the mansion. He could still find faint traces of her expensive perfume lingering in the air amid the chambers she most frequented. When he detected the sublime scent, Draco would pause and wrestle with his emotions. Half the time he lost, and tears would streak down his face as the tight knot loneliness brought about by her death threatened to choke him. She alone understood her son. She alone worked feverishly to look after his safety while his father remained a trapped thrall to Lord Voldemort. Narcissa Malfoy cared for him, her only child, as only a mother could and he deeply missed the sense of protection.

Draco stood and wiped the sides of his face. He damned himself again for failing to keep his feelings in check. For weeks on end he wandered the vacant mansion looking at the vacant spots of items he sold in a desperate bid to keep her alive even though he could not always be by her side. She grew paler, weaker as her life slowly receded. The years of catering to his father and then to Lord Voldemort, all the while fearing the mad dark wizard would take the life of her son, wore on his mother like crashing waves against seaside shoals. It beat Narcissa Malfoy down until her frail body at last gave out in the exhaustive effort to remain alive. Draco did not sit bedside her to hear her last breath, and he doubly damned himself for what he considered his worst crime.

“Mother,” the blond-white haired young man whispered as visions of her gaunt face seemed to hang before him.

A fear she would return as a ghost to actually haunt the manor worried him for months, yet she remained behind the veil separating the living from the dead. Draco never once caught even a small glimpse, nary a hint, of her presence. During the time when Voldemort commandeered the manor for his headquarters, he banished all the other ghosts. The Dark Lord feared and hated death to the point where he could not tolerate the tiniest reminder of the fate awaiting all mortals. In his wake Voldemort left so much death it seemed almost fitting one as insignificant as Harry Potter should bring about the Dark Lord’s demise. Yet even in death the former Tom Riddle continued to take lives. Draco considered his mother one of the final victims.

He rose from the straight-backed chair and glanced around. A small stack of bills and communiques sat on the desk awaiting his attention, but Draco pushed them aside. Time enough could be found for such small annoyances since no other activity filled his long days when at the mansion. Six years since the Battle of Hogwarts lay behind him. Three years passed since he last heard from his father. Not even a year removed since his mother’s death. No one rallied to him in the same manner as the supposed child heroes of Hogwarts. Most of his extended family eschewed any dealings with him or his mother since their involvement with the Deatheaters got revealed and his father found guilty for a multitude of crimes. Draco, himself, barely avoided imprisonment in Azkaban. As result, past associates viewed him as a traitor. Thus, bereft of family and friends, he made the manor his lonely sanctuary.

The walk from the study to the long gallery took all of twenty seconds, yet it felt to Draco as if an hour slipped away. He paused for a moment to note all the missing art, furniture, and portraits of his ancestors. Even the magicked paintings of relatives did not get spared the great purge as the Malfoy’s first sought to pay the legal bills of Lucius Malfoy and then the medical bills of his wife, Narcissa. Only a hidden stash of galleons his family secreted away for centuries kept the estate intact if barren. Draco could live out his life in very modest comfort, but he did not think he could do so in the house of his family. Echoes of the past chased him around every corner. He strolled into the long gallery and glanced outward at the untended grounds.

“Good goddamn, but you’re a mess,” he rumbled at the snow covered and now overgrown expanse stretching on all sides around the great house. “Not an elf in sight.”

A flicker caught Draco’s eye while he stared at the mossy ruins of the first Malfoy Manor a hundred or so meters behind the current manor. A history lesson began to play in his mind as he stared the last remaining walls of the old castle. In 1352 while muggle England huddled terrified during the first and worst wave of bubonic plague, the wizard world fell to fighting among themselves. The pure-blood families united to keep their peerage pure. Others sought to cast them down as elitist and entitled. Only the combines power of eight of the twenty-seven pure families managed to withstand the marauding witch and wizard thugs. The old manor castle, used a final defense, took heavy damage before the fighting ended. The pure-blood families survived, and the Malfoys went on to build their riches and, eventually, a new manor house.

“What in the name of Merlin is that?” Draco asked himself and walked toward the angled, tall windows.

Using a shirtsleeve to clean a spot on the glass, Draco studied the grounds he knew as well as his family tree. His hand unconsciously went for his wand as he recognized a human form darting among the fallen stones and walls. It passed through the overgrowth and walls. Draco harrumphed, but did not put away his wand.

“A ghost.”

However, he did not recognize the semi-opaque figure. The mode and style of dress appeared odder than even some of the more outlandish fashions found in the wizarding world. Furthermore, Draco could detect color, a sight never seen on ghosts who acted as colorless shades of their former human selves. It seemed to wear a blue coat of some sort and brown pants, yet no footwear appeared on it. Additionally, the young man seldom saw a spirit gambol about in the manner of the one he saw below. The ghost looked as if it got pulled along by a staff. The sight of the long branch gave the current owner of the grounds pause.

“Must’ve been a wizard at one point… long ago. Staves are passe,” Draco mused while he observed. He ran a hand through his find hair and dislodged a third from the band tying it in the back. “What is it doing?”

In the near distance the figure took the time to build a snowman, but unlike any Draco ever saw. It resembled a woman with clothing and hair that seemed finely etched into the snow, visible even across the separating span. For fifteen minutes Draco stood transfixed while the ghost completed the rather exquisite figure with deft skill. He privately commended the craftsmanship. The real oddity struck him.

“Why would a ghost build… how would a ghost build a snowman? How is it moving the snow?” The sole occupant of the manor asked the empty gallery walkway.

Draco absentmindedly pushed the untethered hair off the side of his face. A tongue ran across his bottom lip as he tried to make some sense of what he witnessed. He watched the spirit put finishing touches on the strangely beautiful sculpture that would not last a day when the temperatures rose above freezing. The second-to-last remaining Malfoy heir crossed his arms over his rather thin chest, intent on sussing out any possible reason why the ghost behaved in such an unusual manner. It took him a minute to realize the ethereal creature assumed an identical pose and gazed at him across the snowy expanse.

“Is it looking at me?” Draco queried and uncertainty assailed him as to how he should feel regarding the scrutiny. He raised a hand and waved. The being waved in return. “By Barnaby it is looking at me!”

The words barely escaped his lips when the ghost suddenly rose into the air and zoomed toward him. Draco backed up into the gallery. Seconds later the face of very young man hovered on the other side of the glass. White hair, not elderly or gray, wafted about in a wild thatch atop the head. A triangular face, terminating in a pointed chin, boasted eyes as blue as the sky on a pristine winter day. They radiated with intelligence. A pert nose hovered above thin lips. The only feature seeming out of place occurred with what Draco could only call stable-door ears. They stuck out from the sides of the rather finely featured face.

Draco turned his head slightly to one side. The spirit mimicked him. It seemed impertinent. He frowned. The ghost frowned for second, but then his face split into a broad smile. Teeth as white as the snow gleamed. The owner of the grounds and house grew frustrated. He made a dismissive gesture with one hand.

“Go away. We’ve no need for any extra ghosts. Go haunt some other place,” Draco commanded the specter.

The ghost looked at first affronted and then amazed. It stuck its head through the glass, and soon the rest of the body stood on the inside of the gallery. The absurdity of the situation grew even more surreal for Draco when he realized the ghost wore a blue hooded sweatshirt that seemed out of sync with the apparent leather britches it wore. Moreover, the staff carried in the spirit’s hand looked like none other Draco ever saw: the top bent around on itself into a wide c-shape. Furthermore, it gleamed with a silvery light noticeable even in full daylight. A sense of wariness stole across the mind of the corporeal being.

“You really can see me?” The ghost asked in a unique and bizarrely out of place light baritone voice.

“What a ridiculous question,” Draco snapped at the creature. “Be gone. I’ve other things to worry about rather than over some homeless wraith.”

“Wraith? Wraith?” The spirit sputtered. “Do you have any idea who I am?”

“No, and I don’t care. Please, don’t leave any ectoplasm residue on the glass as you depart.”

After issuing his directive, Draco turned and began walking down the gallery toward the stairwell. The lift between floors ceased functioning months ago. No house elves remained to repair the device or to see it got repaired by competent hands. The semi-orphaned Malfoy thought again he needed to try and attach an elf to the house. As he walked along, he caught sight of movement out of the corner of his eye. The ghost kept pace with him.

“Did death completely rattle what’s left of whatever small brains you had to begin with? Do I need to come right out and tell you to leave?” He snapped at the apparition.

“Speaking of small brains, when have you ever seen a ghost look like me?” It snapped right back at him.

Draco paused, filled with self-righteous indignation that an unwanted spirit would address him in such a fashion. He sputtered with nascent rage, especially at the tiny smirk alighted on the thin ghostly mouth, but a piece of his mind stayed his fury. The oddity of the creature seemed a warning of sorts. Draco narrowed his eyes and prepared to simply ignore the pesky specter. However, a question from the ethereal being returned to him.

“Why did you ask if I can see you? Of course I can see you? What kind of squib do you take me for?”

“You don’t look like a cephalopod,” it cheekily rejoined, but then it scrutinized the mortal from head to toe. “Unless you can squirt ink.”

“Squib! Squib!” Draco yelled at it. “Not squid, you buffoon!”

“Getting a little personal now, aren’t you?”

The unusual accent of the ghost announced it came from America, but Draco could not place the exact regional dialect. This compounded the mystery of the spirit. It did not make much sense a Yankee specter would roost in England. Draco’s anger spilled over again. He pulled up the hand holding his wand and aimed it ghost.

“Ah! A wand. That partially explains why you can see me even though most witches and wizards can’t. You must’ve been witness to some rather traumatic events. Can you see threstrals?” It stated and asked.

“Threstrals? How do you… who are you?” Draco blared at the unwanted visitor.

“How rude of me, and here I am in England, home to chivalry and all that,” the ghost said and bowed once. “Allow me to introduce myself. I am Jack Frost, at your service!”

The ghost bowed again.

“What a bloody stupid name! Why would your mum or dad name you after some bleeding children’s story?”

A dangerous light flickered in the creatures eyes. The silver sheen surrounding the staff grew bright. Not only could Draco feel magical forces swirling around him, the temperature in the gallery dropped to near freezing. He could see his breath when he exhaled and his wand hand shivered.

“First, it’s not a stupid name. Second, the children’s stories are about me. I am _the_ one and only Jack Frost!”

Draco felt compelled to minimally accept the evidence gathering around him. The now frigid and inexplicable temperature seemed to bear testament to the ghost’s claims. Yet Draco still nursed his ire.

“I thought you were only six inches high? Where’s your little green suit and the pointed hat with the little bell that goes tingle, tingle, tingle every time you make it snow?” Draco grunted his disparaging questions.

Faster than a blink of an eye the spirit came to hover within mere centimeters of Draco. An intense cold enveloped him that threatened frostbite. A power unlike any he ever encountered began to overwhelm his senses. Since childhood Draco always harbored a sensitivity to magic, and what he felt building around him defied description.

“Wh-who are y-y-you?” The freezing, thin young man stuttered the question.

“I am Jack Frost, wizard. Herald of winter, master of the joys of the cold and snow, and protector of children. What of you?” Jack half-laughed, half-sneered his proclamations and question.

“Draco. Draco Malfoy,” he said as though it should be sufficient to identify him.

“And you called my name stupid?” Jack laughed the words.

He floated backward, and the intense cold eased. The spirit twirled the staff in his hand, and small flakes of snow drifted in the air. Draco glanced at his outstretched hand and wand. Common sense told him any fight with the being would result in disaster. He lowered his arm and pocketed his wand. Then he pulled his robes close around him in an attempt to warm himself.

“Not so stupid after all.”

Jack thumped the end of his crook on the floor and then leaned against it as if it suddenly became part of the manor. His bare feet, however, did not touch the floor. To Draco’s eyes the unusual being appeared to grow increasing substantial by the second until he looked as hale and hearty as a living person, except for the pallid skin. Jack folded his arms across his chest and his blue eyes again scrutinized the wizard.

“Why are you rambling around this place all by yourself? There’s hardly any furniture in the castle,” the man from fairy tales stated.

“Look, pleased to meet you and all, but I’ve got… how’d you know there’s no furniture in the manor?” Draco countered and narrowed his eyes.

“I’ve been through here once or twice while England enjoys this cold spell. I normally don’t get to play in the kingdom much, and I thought this building was abandoned when I stumbled across it. You live out a ways, don’t you?”

“This is my ancestral home…”

“And it’s empty,” Jack interjected.

“Which is none of your concern, Mr. Frost,” Draco spat at him. “I’ve other matters to attend to if you don’t mind. Now, good day!”

“What other matters?”

“What matters is it’s none of your business. Please, go off and create a blizzard some place”

“This hall would be wonderful for sledding,” Jack said, stood upright, and grabbed his staff.

“No, no. Please, not that. I’m sorry I was being rude, but… please, just leave me in peace,” Draco said with ample contrition in his voice. He also held his hands up as if he could somehow defend against the powers of the being.

“Come on, Wizard Malfoy! This hall’s got to be at least a hundred and twenty feet long. It’d be perfect for a toboggan run! Besides, you look like you could use some fun… and I know what I’m talking about on that score.”

“Mr. Frost, I do not need my home filled with snow and then flooded when it melts. Maybe you didn’t think that far ahead.”

“Oh, I thought about it, but I also thought you wouldn’t care if we – how you would say – have a jolly good time of it. Spot of fun. Pip! Pip! Cheerio and all that!” Jack said and slipped in a ludicrous British accent.

“Is there something wrong with you?” Draco asked and stared at the mythical young man.

“Pardon?”

“I don’t mean to sound rude, but you act as though wanton and random destruction of a person’s property equates to fun. So… did I miss something or are you bored and decided to have sport with me?”

“Wizard Malfoy, you really do need to lighten up. You act as though fun doesn’t exist anymore and you don’t have a friend in the world. That’s where I come in, and you’re lucky you can see me ‘cause otherwise you wouldn’t have any idea where the snowball came from,” Jack said and managed to sound serious while a snowball appeared in his hand.

Draco eyed the snowball as he raised a hand and specifically a finger to make a point. However, he could not imagine what he could say to the otherworldly young man that would make an impact. All he wanted came in the desire for the uninvited guest to leave his home. Unfortunately, the comment about friends touched a sore spot. His anger and frustration flared again.

“Listen. My father is in prison. My mother died not even a year ago. Most of the people I used to call friends are either on the run, in prison, or won’t talk to me because of the first two reasons. You don’t know what I’ve been through and why this house is empty, so I’d thank you not to make light of it. Now, please, good day and see yourself out!”

His own words rang in his ears as he turned and stomped down the hall away from the maddening creature. The heels of his once fashionable boots thudded into the sun-faded and worn carpeting of the long gallery. He made a good attempt at pounding out his anger through his feet. He did not make even three meters before his peripheral vision caught movement. Draco stopped and whirled around to face the pest.

“I died once, long ago, but it doesn’t make me a ghost,” said the slender form of the sometimes semi-transparent young man, but more like a teenager in Draco’s eyes. He no longer held a snowball and only his staff. “I got raised from where I drowned and granted these power. For three hundred years no one could see me or hear me, so I know a thing or two about being alone and without friends or family. Do you think maybe I’m exactly what you need right now?”

“No, I do not think that and see no reason to even start,” Draco huffed in irritation.

Jack narrowed his his eyes, and Draco felt himself being scrutinized yet again. He could literally feel the spirit peering at him, and it sent a different type of chill down his spine. Questions formed in the middle of his mind, but Draco found it difficult to find a starting point. Secondly, he did not want to encourage Jack Frost to linger.

“Why’s your father in prison?” Jack asked in so blunt and straightforward a manner it momentarily stunned the owner of the manor.

“That’s a bit personal, don’t you think?” Draco returned after a few moments.

“You said other people you know, past friends, also went to prison. What’d you get yourself into?”

“How can you travel through England and not know my last name?”

“I didn’t think you were that famous or important. Besides, I usually deal with a younger clientele, but I have been know to help out really needy adults,” Jack replied in a slightly flippant manner.

“My family backed the losing side… it shouldn’t have lost, but it did. Everything got undone by a stupid boy, his stupid friends, and people too stupid to see what we actually intended!” Draco growled at Jack.

“Would it surprise you to know Bonaparte said the exact same thing after he lost at the Watering Hole…”

“Waterloo!”

“Sure, whatever, but I’ve heard that kind of talk before. It usually means children are going to suffer the most because the adults in their world are only thinking of themselves and power,” Jack said in a dark tone. He zipped forward and again hovered centimeters before Draco. “Are you one of those adults who only thinks of himself and not how it will affect children down the line?”

Threat surrounded Draco. Although the temperature did not plummet as before, he could feel massive energies swirling around him. Whatever Jack Frost might be, he commanded real power. If Draco respected anything, he respected power.

“While you might live to be one hundred or so years old, I’ve already seen that three times over, and what I’ve seen during that time angers me when I think about it,” Jack said and his voice dropped even lower. “I suspect you were on the losing side of the most recent wizarding war. The fear and terror your side spread kept me and my friends very busy in England and other places. You also really pissed us off, Wizard Malfoy.”

The sense of danger redoubled twice over. Draco felt a different form of cold. The blue eyes before him no longer seemed inviting and playful.

“I know about old Snakeface and what he wanted to do, so don’t think I’m dumb. If it weren’t for the rules placed on us, we’d’ve stopped him the first time… and don’t think for one second we couldn’t’ve.”

Draco backed up a step. Jack kept pace with him. The wizard thought of going for his wand again, but he doubted he would get very far with that action.

“Even now we’re still cleaning up the mess your side left,” Jack said in a subtly hostile voice. “Children lost parents, something you finally seem to understand. Lives got wrecked, Wizard Malfoy, and for what? Because some scaly nitwit thought he could live forever? Did any of you think for one moment he was going to take you along with him? Do you really believe Snaketail cared about you?”

The words rang in the wizard’s ears, especially the insults aimed at Lord Voldemort as old habits dictated. Since the end of the war, Draco began to realize the folly of following Voldemort. He appealed to the blind pride of the pure-blood families, the contempt they felt toward mudbloods and muggle alike, and a surge of guilt swept through Draco. His guilt stemmed from what happened to his father and his mother. They paid the price for following Voldemort, his mother in particular, and the foolishness of believing in the Dark Lord’s empty promises. The strange creature before him appeared acutely aware of the underlying causes of the wizarding war.

“I get what you’re doing,” Jack continued in the same contemptuous manner. “You’re hiding, licking your wounds, nursing old grievances. You try to find some justification for your actions, but can’t because whatever your reasons, they’re as empty as this house. You’ve made your own prison here.”

“Shut your mouth!” Draco screamed at him. “You don’t know anything! You don’t know what it was like being under Voldemort’s thumb. He was so powerful, and we saw him kill…”

Jack remained neutral when Draco faltered, but he remained less than a hand-span away. Grey eyes met blue, pleaded to be released from conversation as terrible memories got dragged to the surface, and did not find a forgiving audience. He seemed trapped by the unusual presence.

“I have power, and I don’t kill with it,” Jack whispered. “Only the weak and fearful kill with power. Did you kill with yours?”

Draco shook his head. As far as he knew he never took a life. The attempts he made on Albus Dumbledore only aided others in taking the old man’s life. Severus Snape did the actual killing, and Draco learned in later years Snape worked as a double-agent for Dumbledore. Moreover, Snape’s killing of the headmaster appeared prearranged as the old wizard already faced death from a curse infecting his body. In the back of his mind where he kept thoughts so private he sometimes lost track of them, Draco felt relieved he never killed a person. He did not think he could bare the stain it would leave on him.

“Good, then we’re not natural enemies. It’s better to have friends, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” Draco hissed at the face before him.

Jack smiled, and Draco saw an overabundance of joy return to the youthful face. It seemed such a complete reversal he almost doubted the past couple of minutes took place. The sense of threat disappeared as quickly as it emerged.

“I’m sorry to hear about your mother. I can tell you loved her, and you’re still recovering from the loss,” Jack said and, like the joy he revealed, the sense of compassion seemed equally earnest.

“Thank you,” the mortal young man quietly acknowledged. “She was the better out of the three of us.”

“Better?”

“The most honorable and decent. She took care of me even when all… that madness began. She loved me, Mr. Frost. I… miss that.”

“Yeah,” Jack sighed the word and seemed to grow distant for a moment. “Mothers, good mothers, are a different form of magic. They don’t need a wand or a staff to make all the difference in the world.”

Draco could not agree more. In a wholly unexpected twist, he suddenly thought of Harry Potter. The boy lost his mother during the first year of his life, yet his mother manage to protect him for fourteen more. He heard rumors Harry saw the shades of his parents and others he loved during moments of crisis. In spite of all the complex emotions he harbored for Harry Potter, a feeling of sorrow Harry lost his mother so young existed. It often tempered the more strident emotions evoked by the name and image of his childhood rival.

“Mr. Frost, why are you really here?” Draco asked when the roiling thoughts of his mother threatened to overcome him.

“Honestly?” Jack counter-queried.

“Yes, honestly.”

“To build that snow statue. I rarely find a place with enough snow and protected from the wind that gives me a chance to do some real magic. Want to go and have a look?”

Against all probability, Draco felt an urge to head out of doors and see the work form himself. He thought it might actually be fun to romp around in the snow; a rare activity even during his youth. He struggled to brush aside the childish desire.

“And I think now I should offer you some advice,” Jack said, and his face settled into a more serious expression.

“You advise me?” Draco scoffed.

“Don’t be fooled by my boyishly good looks. I’ve been around a while!”

Draco rolled his eyes at the somewhat immature coy display the being made while speaking.

“Wizard Malfoy, it’s not too late you, you know?” Jack said and returned to a mature stance.

“Not too late for what?” Draco drolly inquired since he could tell Jack wanted him to ask.

“To make amends. You can still make it onto the nice list if you try.”

“And now you’re going to tell me you work for Father Christmas?”

“I don’t work for him. We’re colleagues and he’s given me some excellent guidance, but we all work for The Man in the Moon,” the slender ethereal young man stated with absolute conviction.

Draco shook his head a little as the preposterous claims rolled over him and said: “Hold on a second. You’re saying Father Christmas is… no, never mind. I don’t want to know. But why do you think I want to be on the nice list?”

A huge smile took over Jack’s face.

“You look mental. Now tell me why?”

“Only those who’ve really lost hope don’t want to be on the nice list. Being on the nice list tells us something good still resides in us no matter how deep down it is or how much we try to deny it. That’s one of the things that makes Santa… Father Christmas so powerful. He knows we all want to be better than we are, and he gives us a reason to be it,” Jack said in a theatrical stage whisper that nearly belittled his intentions.

“You really believe that, don’t you?” Draco inquired in a disbelieving tone.

“You do, too. I can see it on your face. You might try to tell me you’re one of those people who thinks it’s just as good being the villain as it is the hero… but we all want to be the hero, Father Christmas knows this, and so do I.”

Draco did not spare the sarcasm when he asked: “And tell me, great and mighty Jack Frost: how do you turn a villain into a hero?”

“The villain does it himself… or herself… when they realize they can use what made them a villain in the first place for good,” Jack said in a mock conspiratorial whisper. “Skills… and power are neutral on their own. What makes them good or bad depends on the person using it. If you chose to do bad, then you get villainous powers. If you chose to do good, then you get heroic powers. Even people without powers know this.”

Jack floated away from Draco. The creature’s response almost galled him. It sounded canned, pat, and trite. Despite that, he could feel the words tug at something deep within that reminded him of days when the world still held promise. Jack continued to float backward and neared glass of the gallery.

“I can’t always do for adults what I can do for children. The skin becomes a little too tough to get through in older people,” the seemingly young man said as he slowly became semi-transparent. “Sometimes all I can do is remind the person that we don’t often get a lot of choices that are completely in our control. Most of the time we miss the opportunities. But never forgot it is always within your power to change who and what you are. Nothing is written in stone. Destiny changes all the time.”

“Did you get that out of a cracker at Yuletide?” Draco harrumphed.

“Just because it sounds simplistic doesn’t mean is isn’t true, Wizard Malfoy. You of all people should understand the nature of power. You’ve seen in it practice, and you’ve probably got quite a bit yourself. I challenge you to live up to the decency and honor of your mother. Caring about something other than yourself can make all the difference in the world. Look what it did for you!”

Draco opened his mouth to launch a nasty retort, but Jack Frost began laughing. He floated through the window, and then flew in corkscrew pattern until he quickly disappeared into the distance. The wizard stood staring at the space left behind in the wake of the creature’s departure. It angered him Jack Frost managed to get in the last word. Several biting remarks went to waste in Draco’s mouth. He turned and began walking down the long gallery toward the stairs. His mind refused to let go of what he heard in the last few minutes. It left him unable to decide on a mood.

“What a loony,” Draco said as he neared the stairs.

He halted and turned to look out the window. Sunlight glinted off the pristine surface of the snow. Draco’s eyes got drawn to the figure standing frozen in the ruins of the old manor. Curiosity seeped into his veins. Like a potent potion it compelled the wizard. In a half trot he made for the stairs, bounded down them all the way to the ground floor, and emerged near the chamber used as a cloak room. After making his way inside, Draco donned boots, a heavy cloak, gloves, and a hat. Then he wrapped a long wool scarf around his neck several times. Satisfied he could withstand the cold, and memories of the intense cold generated by Jack Frost returned to him, Draco made for one of the rear exits.

The door struggled to push aside the snow mounded against it. A light wind blew from the northwest, but Draco barely felt it since he left little flesh exposed. Once he got past the door, the young man slogged his way through the calf-deep snow. It offered ample resistance despite the powdery nature of the substance. All told it took Draco ten minutes to make his way to the ruins barely one hundred meters from the rear porch. As he neared the old ruins, he wondered what he would discover.

“By Merlin,” Draco whispered in awe as tears came unbidden to his eyes and froze against his cheeks.

Before him stood an exquisite statue of a young woman in a long flowing dress. A smile of serene and sublime peace graced her face of delicate and fine features. One arm stretched outward as though reaching for something far off. The hair etched in the cold substance looked almost real. It lay cinched in a brooch at the nape of the neck and flowed down down the back. In spite of the youthful features, Draco would recognize the face anywhere. It caused the tears to spring from his eyes.

“Mother,” he whispered at the figure.

More and more Draco pondered the unusual being of Jack Frost. He could not imagine the spirit made the snow statue of his mother by accident. It all seemed too planned, and yet a sense of gratitude he got to look upon the beautiful aspect of his mother – cast in a carefree expression he never witnessed during all his years with her – took root in his gut. Draco saw many magical things in his short life, but somehow wondrous never fully entered the picture until that moment. He could not take his eyes away for the sculpture. Part of him wished the statue got made of stone instead of snow because he could not preserve it like he desperately wanted. It seemed symbolic of life to him. One thought did straggle across his mind, and he acted on it.

“Thank you,” he said to the presence he could not detect, but who showed him it did not take a stupendous display of power to make a lasting impression.

**NOTE** : Malfoy Manor is modeled after [Hardwick Hall](http://www.orms.co.uk/insights/hardwick-hall-more-glass-than-wall/) as used in the Harry Potter films. Floor plans are located in the linked pages.

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